The present invention relates to a device and a method for testing a drilling/rivet countersinking process carried out by a drilling/feed unit, in particular for the aerospace sector.
Although applicable to various types of rivets, the present invention and the problems on which it is based will be described in more detail in relation to a lockbolt rivet.
In aircraft construction, riveting is one of the most important types of connection in order, in particular, to connect sheet metal parts made, for example, of light metal alloys or other materials to one another. In this case, the rivet connections have to fulfill certain guidelines in order to be able to ensure a predetermined quality of the rivet connection and absorption of the forces occurring on the aircraft when loaded. Consequently, it is necessary to subject the rivet connections to a specific test method. It has proven to be advantageous here to accordingly test and adjust the drilling/feed machines used later at construction sites on a test device beforehand so that the required quality of the rivet connection is automatically ensured during the actual use at the construction sites. As different drilling/feed machines are used for different rivet connections, these machines used have to be correspondingly tested and preadjusted individually in each case beforehand. An additional difficulty is that the drilling/feed machine cannot be correctly adjusted on the original component as, because of strict regulations, no rivet connection may exist that does not fulfill the quality requirements of this rivet connection. Consequently if the checking of the rivet connection shows that this rivet connection does not comply with the quality standard, this faulty rivet connection would have to be laboriously removed and a corresponding non-conformity report made.